David O'ConnellMilk
April 6th 2009 06:20
Gus Van Sant rejoins the fray of conventional storytelling with his latest, Milk, an important document of change and the influential figure who instigated it. A relief it is to see the director back too, having so underwhelmed audiences in recent years with his series of morose, ponderous, occasionally pointless obsessions. In particular, Last Days, and the terminal Elephant, seemed more likely to leave his most ardent devotees in a comatose state than entertain, feeling far removed from the startling beginnings of Drugstore Cowboy and My Own Private Idaho.
In San Francisco in the 1970’s Harvey Milk became the face of a revolution, an iconic symbol for social change. From humble beginnings - opening a camera store in Castro Street - he assumed the voice for generations of gay men and women ashamed to come out of the closet and defend their neglected civil rights.
Sean Penn, in his Oscar winning turn, crawls inside skin of this man, relying not on just interpretative tics or his vague physical resemblance. Rather, his portrayal becomes an all-encompassing transformation, assuming the historical form of Milk with all of his physical and verbal traits faithfully and admiringly reinstated.
Dustin Lance Black’s Oscar-winning screenplay has an interesting structure. Rightfully, the earlier years of Milk’s struggle to win credence, through his failed campaigns for San Francisco’s Board of Supervisors, are given less emphasis. The last months are the ones most crucial in terms of both historical impact and dramatic impetus as Milk’s modest aspirations come to fruition, implicating an entire nation in a systematic discrimination.
Despite the thwarted initial campaigns, a groundswell of support began to rock the establishment’s boat and create waves of its own. Once his goal for election became a reality, the foundations of intolerance were irrovocably shifted, and Milk's legacy was well on the way to being fulfilled.
As a dark agent for the majority, the unstable Dan White (Josh Brolin) is never far away, the shadow of prejudice cast by his malignant presence. Van Sant skillfully navigates Milk through the minefield of outlandish precedent-setting with a meticulous eye for detail that quells any self-righteous need to turn his portrayal into a quest for martyrdom.
Recreations of Milk’s memoir-like recounting of those seminal years are cleverly used as a framing device; they act as a guiding narrative light, with important aspects of the story neatly contextualized with relevant historical-footage inserts.
On a personal level, Milk’s life endured a series of satisfying but heartbreaking relationships. He recognized his ability to magnetize damaged cases such as Jack Lira (Diego Luna) whose suicide – one of many to haunt Milk – was another sad reflection of unenlightened times. Many men and women similarly fell by the wayside, unable to bear the brunt of hiding their sexual dysfunction - as proclaimed by the consensus of public opinion.
Danny Elfman’s sparse, well-spotted score is applied with a feathery touch, adding a vague tinge of Americana to many scenes, whilst Harris Savides’ cinematography achieves a sterling balance of glossy recreation with an eye for grungy detail. The most stunning visual moment of the film however has to be that extraordinary ‘whistle’ shot – the stark reflection of a crime scene in the steely, dormant whistle of a murdered gay man in an alleyway.
Overflowing with authentic details of this era with its delicately shifting balance of power, Milk is Gus Van Sant’s true return to form, the realisation of a story crucial to his own life, and one he allows to grow into something both compelling, and ultimately, genuinely moving.
In San Francisco in the 1970’s Harvey Milk became the face of a revolution, an iconic symbol for social change. From humble beginnings - opening a camera store in Castro Street - he assumed the voice for generations of gay men and women ashamed to come out of the closet and defend their neglected civil rights.
Sean Penn, in his Oscar winning turn, crawls inside skin of this man, relying not on just interpretative tics or his vague physical resemblance. Rather, his portrayal becomes an all-encompassing transformation, assuming the historical form of Milk with all of his physical and verbal traits faithfully and admiringly reinstated.
Dustin Lance Black’s Oscar-winning screenplay has an interesting structure. Rightfully, the earlier years of Milk’s struggle to win credence, through his failed campaigns for San Francisco’s Board of Supervisors, are given less emphasis. The last months are the ones most crucial in terms of both historical impact and dramatic impetus as Milk’s modest aspirations come to fruition, implicating an entire nation in a systematic discrimination.
Despite the thwarted initial campaigns, a groundswell of support began to rock the establishment’s boat and create waves of its own. Once his goal for election became a reality, the foundations of intolerance were irrovocably shifted, and Milk's legacy was well on the way to being fulfilled.
As a dark agent for the majority, the unstable Dan White (Josh Brolin) is never far away, the shadow of prejudice cast by his malignant presence. Van Sant skillfully navigates Milk through the minefield of outlandish precedent-setting with a meticulous eye for detail that quells any self-righteous need to turn his portrayal into a quest for martyrdom.
Recreations of Milk’s memoir-like recounting of those seminal years are cleverly used as a framing device; they act as a guiding narrative light, with important aspects of the story neatly contextualized with relevant historical-footage inserts.
On a personal level, Milk’s life endured a series of satisfying but heartbreaking relationships. He recognized his ability to magnetize damaged cases such as Jack Lira (Diego Luna) whose suicide – one of many to haunt Milk – was another sad reflection of unenlightened times. Many men and women similarly fell by the wayside, unable to bear the brunt of hiding their sexual dysfunction - as proclaimed by the consensus of public opinion.
Josh Brolin as Dan White and Sean Penn as Harvey Milk
Danny Elfman’s sparse, well-spotted score is applied with a feathery touch, adding a vague tinge of Americana to many scenes, whilst Harris Savides’ cinematography achieves a sterling balance of glossy recreation with an eye for grungy detail. The most stunning visual moment of the film however has to be that extraordinary ‘whistle’ shot – the stark reflection of a crime scene in the steely, dormant whistle of a murdered gay man in an alleyway.
Overflowing with authentic details of this era with its delicately shifting balance of power, Milk is Gus Van Sant’s true return to form, the realisation of a story crucial to his own life, and one he allows to grow into something both compelling, and ultimately, genuinely moving.
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Comment by Cibbuano
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so - what do you think? If this had come before the election, would Prop 8 have gone down?